You're Lying, Aren't You?

After the exam results were announced, his disciples and Cecilia broke into cheers. Amid all that rejoicing, the only face that stayed complicated belonged to Cheon Hwi—the man who now had to pay out the wishes.

I really didn't think they'd all clear the mark...

The disciples had placed within the top three thousand of the entire academy, and they had even surpassed the personal ranks he had set as their goals. The result was simple. He had to grant the wishes he had promised, exactly as agreed.

"Ha... Why did I ever do that?"

Cheon Hwi clutched his head. Had it been a problem he could settle with force, there would have been nothing to agonize over. This time was different.

Was it that he couldn't predict what they would wish for?

No. The trouble was that he could predict them far too well.

Even in his previous life, he had handed out wish tokens now and then to stir his disciples' motivation. The first time, they had still been children, so a wish came to nothing more than a piece of traditional candy or a stick of glazed fruit. The burden had been light. Once they grew a little older, though, they began wishing only for things that were difficult, and there came a point when he tied the tokens solely to impossible goals—or stopped offering them at all.

As their master, he had never once gone easy on their training, and still they asked to spar without end. Not even a leech clung the way they did. Of course, the disciples of this life found the training grueling enough on its own. And when they did spar, he won so utterly that they were unlikely to make so crude a wish as a full day of matches.

But when had life ever been content to flow only as reason dictated?

"I'm overthinking it..."

Surely it was still too much to assume. For now.

Inside the underground training hall, two of his disciples sat with Cecilia gathered around them. Before that small assembly, Cheon Hwi stood looking utterly drained. He resembled a man granting wishes far less than a condemned prisoner waiting to hear his sentence.

"Well then. You've worked hard, so speak your wishes. Whatever they are, I shall grant them."

That was what his mouth said. From the pit of his heart, a prayer surged up instead. Please... don't say anything strange.

The first to speak was, unexpectedly, Seol.

"I want you to train me alone. Just for one day."

Cheon Hwi's brow lifted a fraction. Why were ominous hunches never wrong?

"...With me?"

"Yeah. I don't even need a spar. Teach me all day."

Then again, when it came to the hunger to grow stronger, there had never been anyone who could match Seol.

"Hmm..."

This is actually all right, isn't it?

Seol had said with her own mouth that she didn't even want a spar. A day spent doing nothing but correcting her form shouldn't be especially taxing. Cheon Hwi turned the thought over and nodded.

"Very well. Name the time whenever you wish."

"Now."

"Right. Next?"

"Now."

Seol kept insisting she wanted to train this very moment, but Cheon Hwi brushed past her with perfect ease and turned to Hyeon.

Now? What now.

The will to train was a fine thing to see. But if zeal ran so hot that it ruined the body, it was worse than not training at all.

"Hyeon. What is your wish?"

Hyeon's turn had come. She raised her hand slowly. There was that familiar cold composure, the poise of the one who always held the center among the disciples. This time, though, a little hesitation lingered before she spoke.

"I..."

Every gaze gathered on her.

"Could I put it off? Just a little."

At that, Cheon Hwi looked faintly surprised.

"I don't mind. But have you a reason?"

"There isn't anything I want badly enough. Not yet."

He studied ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her in silence, then nodded.

"Very well. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Then Hyeon may tell me later."

"Really?"

"I never set a deadline, and the wish token is yours. However you choose to use it, that choice is yours."

Even after the words had ended, Hyeon watched him without speaking. Then, very slightly, she lowered her head.

"...Thank you."

"For a thing like this? Now then, Seol, think on the time and tell me when—"

"Make it a spar."

"...?"

Why, all of a sudden, was training turning into a spar?

"The time is now."

"...Seol. I refused the training because of your stamina, and your body..."

"It's fine. Cecilia will heal me."

Why had he put it off? A single word of agreement and it would have ended as training. The sessions he had shared with Seol in his previous life must have risen unbidden, and he had flinched from them without knowing it. Sigh. What a fate.

"...Fine. Then we do it now. You two, it's late. Go on back first."

"Okay."

Seol answered at once and fell in behind him.

As he had promised Seol, Cheon Hwi went to the training ground. A short while later she appeared with her hair bound tight, looking for all the world like a warrior striding out to battle.

"No thought of changing it back to training...?"

"None."

Heh. Truly obstinate. She might at least think for a moment.

"Fine. Then the ti—!"

The words never finished. Seol's sword sheared past his head with a thin, vicious whistle.

"Have you lost your mind?!"

A spar, she had said, and she opened with killing moves? She had been like this in his last life. She was like this in this one too.

"No! What kind of senior charges a junior with a live blade and killing techniques?!"

Why does she pull the senior card only at times like this? Am I supposed to turn Seol into some lunatic who swings killing moves at her own master? No. Better, this time, that I'm the junior.

"Because you're stronger than me."

That was Seol's answer to him. And with the answer given, she began to swing again.

Much the same as the previous life.

The sword moved swift and light, and folded inside that brightness was the intent to kill.

Had I been only passably strong, I would have died long ago.

It could hardly be called a match for the steadfast, unyielding sword of Heaven-Breaking. But would a man known as the Number One Under Heaven possess only the Heaven-Breaking Sword Technique? To become truly strong, a martial artist had to build a path that was their own. He could guide her along that path. That was why he was Seol's master.

Steel met steel in a sharp, ringing clash.

"An opening...!"

The blade hissed in again.

"Are you out of your mind?! Fail to dodge, and you're dead!"

"There's no way you would fail to dodge...!"

"And why have you had so much faith in me this entire ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠time?!"

If she had recovered the memories of her previous life, he might have understood. She had not. Even in ordinary training she kept demanding that he call her senior, while she called him junior. Fine. He had no intention of scolding her merely because those memories had not returned. But still.

You decide someone is your junior, and then you fly at them like you mean to kill them. Is that normal?!

If you want to treat me as a junior, then stop using killing moves. If you're going to fight with killing moves, then stop treating me as a junior!

The absurdity of it left him without words. Seol did not wait for them.

"Here I come!"

She charged again. The blades cracked together.

I'm going to lose my mind.

Had they been using wooden swords, he could at least have knocked her out. These were live blades, and there wasn't even a scabbard between them. In a situation like this, he had to subdue her without letting her come to harm...

Steel crashed in a ragged chain of impacts.

"Disciple! Did I not tell you to stop using killing moves?!"

"I'm the senior..."

"What senior uses killing moves on a junior?!"

"..."

At a disadvantage, she had nothing to say.

No. Has her mind come loose?

A killing move was an attack meant to kill. She had thrown such attacks at him without number. There was no way her mind was still intact. And yet, if there was one mercy in it—

Has she entered no-mind?

In the better sense, she was not in her right mind.

As expected. Her talent, at least, is overwhelming.

Then there was only one thing for him to do: evade and turn aside Seol's endless killing moves, and correct her swordsmanship while he did it. Even a considerable master would have found that difficult. She was simply drunk on the sword. She spared no thought for her own body and only swung, a kind of all-or-nothing assault that courted mutual destruction. What was anyone meant to do with that?

But I can.

It was something he had done in his previous life until he was sick of it.

"Hah... hah... I can... still... go on."

"It's too much."

Seol had no stamina left to move. Swept up in no-mind, she had swung for hours and used nothing but attacks that staked her life. Every single one of them had demanded the whole of her inner energy. How could her stamina still be sound?

"...Yeah."

She seemed to know it. With a faintly sullen look, she conceded against her will.

"Even so, you did well."

"I... got praised..."

Seol looked up at him, overcome by the simple fact of it.

"Is it so shocking as all that?"

Have I truly praised them so little?

Praise had been rare in his previous life, certainly. In this one, he had thought he'd given it fairly often.

"Praise... Mas— you never really gave any."

Her words blurred in the middle.

"Mas—?"

"...It's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠nothing."

Seol shook her head and smiled, quiet. The smile was tender enough to ache, and longing clung to it. Cheon Hwi frowned, uneasy.

Something is... off.

Every one of her reactions was subtly different. Exhausted as she was, her eyes were far deeper than usual, and her way of speaking was familiar and strange at once.

"Anyway, you still say odd things now and then. That much hasn't changed."

"...I've been like that from the start."

"......"

The words caught in his throat. That was precisely the sort of thing the Seol of his previous life used to say.

"...I miss it."

The face that said it was drenched in melancholy.

"At any rate, rest first. Recover before anything else."

He spoke while stroking her hair.

"Sir Cheon Hwi. May I speak my wish now as well?"

Cecilia, who by all rights should already have gone back, was speaking to him.

"...? Had you not left?"

"No. More than that, I would like to make my wish now. Would that be possible?"

"I see no reason why not."

"Then, over there."

With that, Cheon Hwi set off somewhere with Cecilia beside him.

"...Idiot."

Seol watched him go, the rebuke small and brief. He never noticed. He only drew farther and farther away.

The disciples had spoken their wishes. One had asked for training. One had asked for a little time to think. And Cheon Hwi had told every one of them that it was possible. But there was still one person left. One person who had not yet used a wish token.

"So, Cecilia. What is your wish?"

She parted her lips quietly, as if beginning a prayer.

"I want to know what kind of being you are. No—what kind of past you have lived."

"And what's supposed to be so interesting about the past of a boy who isn't even twenty?"

"You're lying, aren't you?"

Her tone was utterly certain. It was the same voice she had used the first time they met, when he told her he possessed divine power. If anything had changed, it was that this time there was no wariness in her at all.

"What makes you so sure?"

"When I first saw you, I simply assumed you were mad."

This brat?

For an instant Cheon Hwi nearly had a fit. Cecilia paid him no mind and went on.

"But that wasn't it."

"Then what was it?"

"You treat only those girls as your disciples. Your schemes are difficult to read, and you wield a strength that does not belong to your age. Wherever one looks, something is strange, isn't it?"

He had nothing to say to that. Now that she had laid it out, she wasn't wrong. But why had no one else ever said a word about it? He had only been acting on the habits of his previous life, and yet not a single person had called him on it. Not even his disciples.

Hmm... Is my acting truly that exceptional?

In truth, everyone else had simply dismissed Cheon Hwi as a lunatic and decided not to bother. He had no way of knowing that, and so he began bending the matter until it suited his taste.

"So. Will you grant my wish?"

Before he could sink any deeper into that misunderstanding, Cecilia pressed the wish once more. And Cheon Hwi's answer was more than enough to startle her.